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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25876366">My Mother's Contact</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account'>orphan_account</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>No Fandom</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Abusive Parents, Bad Parenting, Mommy Issues</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 09:14:31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>816</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25876366</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>This is my relationship with my mother.</p><p>If you have a complicated relationship with yours, I think this could help you.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>My Mother's Contact</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I live with my mother. But I don’t know her.</p><p>Let me explain.</p><p>You know how you have mental contacts? Like the contacts in your phone, I mean. Birthday, number, name, photo, notes, address. Just mental. And you know how you delete contacts when you have to. When you know longer care about a person’s birthday or number or name.<br/>
I deleted a mental contact recently.</p><p>It was hard to do, considering I live with her. How do you delete the address of somebody you live with? But you don’t have to forget the address, really, you just have to not care.</p><p>I told her I’d do it. She knew I would. She knew I would but she did it anyway. I told her, I said, </p><p>“Mom. Please. I love you. I do. You know it’s true. But I’m tired. I’m tired and I’m depressed and I refuse to put myself below you. I can’t control what you do. I cannot control you. But you can control you. You can choose to stop acting like this, you can choose to love me, you can choose to compromise, and you can choose to make us both happy. Or you can choose the alternative. The trauma, lack of trust, damaged relationship, fear, unhappiness, secrecy, a million other no good words. It’s up to you. You know what will happen. Your choice, your say, you make the final decision.”</p><p>Do you know what she said?<br/>
She told me to get over myself. She told me I was being childish.</p><p>I wasn’t surprised. I was.. Disappointed, maybe?<br/>
I was. I was disappointed. Not that much, though. I think, more than anything, I was just.. Numb.<br/>
Hollow. Whatever you want to call it. I realized the hand life had dealt me and I just felt defeated. </p><p>“Okay.” That’s what I said to her. “Okay.” What else was I supposed to say? Why can’t you just love me? What was the point of having a child if you were just going to ruin them? </p><p>The conversation ended there. There was nothing else to be said. I’d heard my phone go off shortly after, but I didn’t look at it. I never did, actually, I couldn’t tell you what she’d said if you asked me. At that point, it wouldn’t have made a difference. </p><p>That’s the type of shit that makes you delete a person’s contact. Only problem was that she was upstairs. And she wasn’t going anywhere for another four years. </p><p>But I’d been fighting all my life. This was not a new conversation. This conversation was woven into every look, every word, every breath. This was just the first time it had been laid out in front of us for us to pick apart. I was hoping I’d been mistaken. I was hoping I’d just read her eyes wrong. I was wrong. And I was tired.</p><p>God, I was exhausted, and I was bloody, and bruised, and battered. I had armor on, but it was so wore down each clang of her sword sliced my skin even through the metal, it was all weighing down on me, and yes, I’m a warrior and I take absolute pride in that fact, but a warrior cannot spend fourteen years straight on the battlefield. The battlefield was soaked with blood and everywhere you looked there was a corpse and its matching ghost of our past. </p><p>I needed off.</p><p>I needed out. I didn’t want her contact if this is what came in the package deal. </p><p>Her contact’s been deleted for a while now. I’m not sure when it happened. Sometime in the days following. Like I said, I was numb, and the next few days had sort of blurred together while I was processing.</p><p>I’m not sure why, exactly, it had made such a difference to me. I don’t think it did, even. I don’t think the conversation upset me much. How can something completely expected upset you? No, I think it was the loss that got to me. The loss of what I’d been hoping could exist. I was hoping, praying even, for growth, and instead I lost a contact. </p><p>They say that life works in mysterious ways. I’m not so sure about that. But I do know this couldn’t have been avoided. It’s just.. Who she is. She can’t sustain a relationship. </p><p>But I can’t- no, I WON’T have a damaged relationship. I refuse. I refuse to let that drag me down, I refuse to let it sit as a stain on my happiness. I won’t have a damaged relationship with my mother. So I deleted it. I have no relationship with my mother. I have no feelings towards my mother. ‘Empty, numb, hollow’, whatever you want to call it. </p><p>I don’t know my mother. Because I chose not to. I can’t handle knowing her. So I deleted her contact. </p><p>Good riddance.</p>
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